Design and graphics related applications, such as Adobe® Illustrator®, typically provide various ways for a user to specify or otherwise select color, including text based and graphical color pickers. Examples of text based color pickers include input boxes for entering RGB (Red, Green, Blue), CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black), and HSB (Hue, Saturation, Brightness) values for a particular color. Examples of graphical color pickers include color sliders, color wheels, and color grids. Color pickers typically display a continuous spectrum of colors from which a user can choose.
There are cases in which users are limited to a particular set of allowed colors due to physical or other constraints. For example, users who work in print, silk screening, and branding often must work with a particular color library comprising of a finite number of colors. A continuous spectrum color picker is less useful in that it will pick colors outside of the allowed color set. If a user uses the Pantone library, for example, the user typically must first specify a color from a continuous spectrum color picker, and then request the closest Pantone color to that color. If the returned Pantone color is not desirable to the user, the user goes back, specifies another color from the continuous spectrum color picker, and again requests the closest Pantone color to that color. This process continues until a desirable Pantone color is returned. Only one Pantone color can be requested at a time. Thus, a Pantone color is selected by trial and error, testing out a series of guesses until a desirable Pantone color is found. This process is repetitive, inefficient, and may yield a suboptimal result. For example, a frustrated user may simply make do with an unsatisfactory color rather than waste time trying to find a better color. This process is also extremely tedious when attempting to find a set of related colors within the Pantone set. Since the user is navigating the continuous spectrum of colors using a color picker the user is unable to answer questions like, “What is the next greenest Pantone color?” or “What is the next most saturated Pantone color?” Thus, improved techniques for color selection are needed.